


Where the Falling Angel Meets the Rising Ape

by Cecil_G_P



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Character Study, Coming of Age, Crowley Was Not Raphael Before Falling (Good Omens), Discorporation (Good Omens), M/M, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Pre-Canon: Good Omens, combo book and tv canon, im sorry aziraphale will probably only make occasional appearances in this one folks, in a demon sort of way
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-04
Updated: 2020-06-10
Packaged: 2021-03-03 21:22:16
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,630
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24532234
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cecil_G_P/pseuds/Cecil_G_P
Summary: Roaming the flat desert of Earth, there was no archangel to chide him for his pride. And he was proud. He stole a little piece of Eden from Her. He grinned and took the flower down from his hair, basking in its seemingly ethereal glow. He was proud. If he had been in heaven he’d be glowing with it now, brighter than his largest stars. But he wasn’t in heaven and there was no one to tell him to stop. Maybe, he thought for the first time since the fall, this demon thing wasn’t so bad after all.In the beginning, Crowley fell, and he turned out all the better for it.Will ATTEMPT to update weekly on Wednesdays.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Kudos: 5





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> As noted in the tags, this will be a combination of book and tv canon. Most notably Aziraphale and Crowley have had multiple corporations in this fic, each of which look wildly different from the others. The first chapter features the David Tennant corporation.
> 
> The title is a quote from Terry Pratchett's Hogfather.

The first thing Crowley did when he got back to Earth was look in the mirror. He’d been discorproated again, having forgotten to miracle away his corproration’s need for sleep and promptly passed out in the middle of a crosswalk. Only it wasn’t a crosswalk because demons didn’t use crosswalks, they jaywalked of course, unless they were in the company of certain fussy angels. It was all rather a mess. The driver he had been intending to merely piss off had instead ran him over and now had a lifetime of trauma to contend with. Dagon had expressed their appreciation for job dedication, but had he really had to go and lose another body in the course of it? Crowley groaned, already dreading the stack of paperwork he would need to go through to get another one. To save time however, he had ticked off the boxes on his corporation preference sheet at random - Satan knows it was rarely looked at anyways and even rarer obeyed.

So when he popped back into place at his apartment he went straight to a mirror. He was nude, of course, as he had yet to miracle on any clothes, and he was pale and unblemished. Crowley scowled, not looking forward to getting sunburnt half to death the next time he spent more than 20 minutes in the sun. The body was slender to the point of unsettling and he wondered, vaguely, if they had even given him the right number of bones. He contorted himself into a few ghastly positions to check. The body was flexible, and what most humans nowadays would assume to be male. Experimentally, he tried a few pushups and despaired at the apparent lack of upper arm strength. It was attractive, at least, in a bizarre snakish sort of way that he figured he could dress up to look suitably demonic. But what really stole the show was the hair. 

It was red. He’d had red hair before but never this bright. It was silky smooth and tumbled down his shoulders in waves, almost but not quite hiding his yellow irises from view. He sat down with his legs crossed beneath himself and shook it back to get a better look at the face. But when he opened his eyes, he froze. 

Back as an angel it had been eons before it even occurred to him that he had an appearance. He knew he had a form, even if it wasn’t necessarily physical. And he knew other angels had forms, and he knew what they looked like, and how to tell them apart. But aside from his limited view of his own varied limbs and ethereal matter he never really considered how he looked to others. 

The hair reminded him of the first glimpse he had ever had of his own reflection. 

He’d been up in the firmament, concocting a new galaxy. Raphael had stopped by to check his work and pass on an order from on high; there was a new material to work with.

It was deceptively simple, formed from two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen, and yet it acted as a universal solvent, accessed all its state changes in a relatively narrow temperature range, and could support the new invention the almighty was tentatively calling “life.”

“And if you lower it’s temperature just a bit then it goes into its solid state which looks a bit like…” Raphael trailed off in concentration. “This!” He flourished the sheet of ice towards the younger angel. Crowley took it, amazed at how fast the elements had solidified. But gazing into it, he discovered another property of this strange new material. 

It was reflective.

A being peered back at Crowley from inside the ice. It was large and swirling and prismatic in places. He had less eyes than Raphael but more limbs than Micheal, and much of him was adorned with mouths that gaped back at their own reflection. Some of his ends ribboned off into the void beyond. To either side of him were two expansive wings, cut from the black cloth of space. They struck an imposing silhouette against the nebulae behind him, sucking in its light like a black hole and glowing at their frayed edges where the light, still visible, resisted the wings’ gravitational pull. The nebulae behind him popped and a wall of flame, not holy nor infernal but starfire, framed what could be approximated to be a face in red light, radiating flares curling around his wings.

Back in the present, Crowley drew his wings out. Greedily, they started soaking up all the light in the room, and a faint glow began to form in his primaries. The red hair stood out starkly against his dark wings, reminiscent of the nebula that had lit them so long ago. He remembered how Rapheal had laughed at his awestruck expression and gently chastised him against vanity before heading back to his work. 

He sighed at his reflection, feeling the ache of nostalgia settle into his core before folding his wings away. He shivered a little in the cool air of his apartment, the new corporation apparently useless at preserving heat, and absently miracled a silky black bathrobe around his shoulders. 

He made to look out the window but before he could even make it two steps he heard the telltale click of his front door unlocking itself. Crowley tensed and silently started debating the merits of sprinting to his hidden safe with abandon. But then the door swung open and the sound of footsteps filtered through. Fussy, prissy,  _ bastardous  _ footsteps. Crowley’s shoulders dropped in relief.

“Hey, angel.” He called out in his most sultry tone, trying not to cringe at how he missed the mark in this new voice.  _ Oh, he was going to have to work on that. _

“Crowley!” The angel's voice brightened in surprise.

Crowley rounded the corridor and leaned a shoulder against the hallway’s doorless frame. He shifted his shoulders so that one of his bathrobe’s shoulders slipped down to reveal skin and angled his face in a way that nonchalantly waterfalled his shiny new hair over his shoulders. He gave Aziraphale a smirk. The angel’s smile grew at the sight of him, and he placed his things on the entryway table without looking before striding towards him. 

“Back already! How do you feel?”

“Like a new man.” He stretched his arms overhead. “Literally.” 

“Well, it’s good to see you hale and whole. And after only thirty years, it usually takes you twice as long.”

“Well, I rushed the paperwork a bit.” Only thirty, that wasn’t bad at all for infernal office work. Despite his attempts to end his reminiscing he felt another pang of nostalgia. Unthinkingly he crossed his arms around his midsection. “What are you doing in my apartment?” 

“Oh! Well…” He flushed and looked back to the table. Crowley followed his gaze to see a well-worn book on plant care. “I was trying to keep your plants alive for you.” 

“Trying?”

“Yes! Well- that is to say-” The angel looked around frantically for a distraction. His eyes fell upon Crowley's arms where they squeezed around himself and took in his unsteady lean against the doorway. “Have you eaten since you recorporated? Or has hell rethought their stance on sending you up here empty yet?”

It was Crowley’s turn to blush, as he realized the so-called nostalgia pains were actually something more physical. “Ah, no. Haven’t been back for more than half an hour. Haven’t even figured out how to dress yet.”

Aziraphale frowned. “Why not just dress in one of your usual styles?”

“It’ll be out of date by now!” He cried, scandalized.

“So?”

“So, I’ll look stupid.”

“Well, I’ve been wearing the same outfits for the past century.”

“My point exactly.”

The angel sniffed, slightly miffed. “There’s no reason to be rude, dear. Though I do suppose you have the god-given right to be wrong about whatever you please.” 

Crowley snorted. “God-stolen right, more like.”

“Come now,” Zira snapped his fingers and materialized a close approximation to Crowley’s usual outfit. “Food first, you can look to the humans for inspiration while we’re out.”

“Tartan?” The demon sputtered, pulling at the miracled clothing. “This color palette is all wrong for me.” He sighed and applied a small miracle of his own to turn all the clothes black. He kept the materials however, which were slightly less fashionable than his usual but softer.

“You wear the same colors no matter the corporation dear, I don’t see how it matters.” Aziraphale rolled his eyes but held his elbow out nonetheless for Crowley to take. 

The demon did so with only a little grumbling, as the hunger set in in earnest and he found himself swaying a bit on his feet.

“Oh, my dear boy!” The angel tittered as he steadied him. “Come, there’s a wonderful new ramen place that’s just opened on your street. We’ll set you right in no time.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Crowley makes some planets, some enemies, and one single friend. Not necessarily in that order.

Eden is disintegrating. The apple is gone and so is Eve and the man and the angel’s sword. Even the angel himself is gone, to where Crowley doesn’t know. But he knows this. Eden is disintegrating. He sits in the garden, examining the thick fingers of his first-ever human corporation and watches the edges of the foliage crumble to sand. He remembers making planets so like this, in the beginning. After water had been introduced he took a break from the gaseous planets and spun millions of little blue-green ones, self-sustaining ecosystems that fit like a marble in his then angelic palm. He lined them up for Raphael’s examination and preened under his superior’s praise. 

“Very good, young one. You may put them in place. Except,” the archangel stopped in front of one and hesitated as he watched it rotate. “I will take this one for further consideration. And the map of the system you intend to place it in.”

“Consideration?”

“Yes. For the almighty’s new project. She’s requested a sample of our best prototypes.”

Sitting now, in a dying Eden, the memory makes him sick to his new stomach. How much of this life is unique to the almighty’s personal garden? How much of it did she steal from him? From others? The sand has crept up on him in his reminiscing, and his eyes fall on a lush yellow flower as big as his open palm. The diamond shaped petals were so silky they shone in the sunlight, brilliant purple staminas spread out in a starburst pattern from the center, it hung on a vine so tantalizingly close to him. As he watched, the decay crept through the garden and up the vine. He watched it creep up the stem, withering the world around it and turning it to sand. The first leaf on the flower’s stem crumbles. He thinks of his planets. 

Before he can blink his hands are on the stem, twisting it frantically, trying to break it off before the decay reaches it. In a sudden jerky movement the stem snaps free and he falls back at the sudden lack of resistance. The remaining stem crumbles to dust before his eyes. 

The demon looks at the flower in his hands, untouched by the desolation. He looks to the sky, terrified for a singular hysterical moment that he could fall again. But the sky remains smooth blue. The expression “don’t look a gift horse in the mouth” has yet to be invented but the demon gets the gist, and bolts off to who knows where with the flower in hand. 

Over the course of the next week, not that anybody has started calling them that yet, he keeps the flower tucked in his hair. It may only be a small piece but Eden lives on, he muses. 

When Raphael chose one of his planets to show the almighty Crowley had glowed with pride. Literally. Raphael had shot him a disapproving frown.

“Whatever is that for?”

“Oh, sorry!” The young angel tried to tamper down his joy. “It’s just exciting, one of my planets being shown to the almighty!” 

“Why?”

“Why what?”

“Why is this exciting? Planets get shown to the almighty all the time.”

“Oh, well,” He could feel himself deflate a bit. “She’s never seen one of mine before.”

“And that makes you glow because…?”

“It’s just… nice, I suppose. To feel as if I’ve done a good job. That I’m helping Her.”

“You help her all the time, what do you think you’re doing out here?”

“Well, yes. But it’s nice to have… confirmation.”

“Ah…” There’s a dawning realization spreading through Raphael’s network of eyes. “This confirmation… it makes you feel better, does it? Than the other angels,”

“That’s not-”

“This… pride. It’s unangelic.”

“I didn’t-”

“Perhaps you should spend some more time with your fellow angels. It may help you remember your place.”

***

Roaming the flat desert of Earth, there was no archangel to chide him for his pride. And he was proud. He stole a little piece of Eden from Her. He grinned and took the flower down from his hair, basking in its seemingly ethereal glow. He was proud. If he had been in heaven he’d be glowing with it now, brighter than his largest stars. But he wasn’t in heaven and there was no one to tell him to stop. Maybe, he thought for the first time since the fall, this demon thing wasn’t so bad after all. 

After nearly seven sunrises wandering the desert he turned a corner and ran into Eve. Ran straight into her fist. 

“OOF,” He said, very dignified, as he fell flat on his back. He blinked up at the swimming figures above him and kept blinking until they finally coalesced back into one. 

“Eat the apple! He says! What harm could it ever do! He says! Don’t you want to know! He says! What were you even trying to accomplish with all this?!” She screamed, gesturing to the world around her. 

“Dunno, didn’t think that far ahead.” 

“Didn’t think about getting me kicked out of the garden? While pregnant?”

“I didn’t know you’d get kicked out!” He pushed himself to his feet. “All they said was  _ Crawly, get up there and cause some trouble!  _ And I caused the only trouble that was up there to be caused! I didn’t know it would-” he spun around “-that She would-” he waved his hands at all the sand “-that there would be consequences!” He stopped in front of her, slightly bowed, arms out in incredulity, eyebrows as high up as they would go. 

She snorted at him. “Why’ve you got a dead lizard in your hair?”

“A lizard?” He huffed. “I’d have thought, with you having eaten the apple of knowledge and everything, that you’d recognize one of Eden’s very own flowers!” He smirked in triumph and plucked the flower from his hair, flourishing it out to her. 

But when he held it out it was limp and brown, and as he held it a few of its petals fell off and fluttered towards the sand.

“It looks pretty dead to me,” Eve said, unimpressed. 

“It wasn’t earlier.”

“What did you do to it?”

“I didn’t do anything!”

“And it just died like that?”

“I guess.”

They stared at the wilted flower between them.

“I think you might be bad for plants.”

“Nuh-uh!”

Eve sighed. “You know, I’m not really supposed to hang out with you anymore.”

“Oh.”

“But there’s some weird looking plants over by this lake, and you owe me a taste test.”

“Oh! Uh,”

“At least until Adam wakes up, or that angel comes back? Pretty please! It’s been so boring without you!”

While… when she puts it like that. Crowley dropped the flower to the sand, it doesn’t disintegrate, but from the look of things it doesn’t make much difference. He followed the original woman to the lake. 

***

  
  


Growing a planet is different from growing a plant. In heaven, Crowley had set whole galaxies into motion, but after you run a few numbers and set some of the basic elements to collide they’re self-sustaining systems. Once the universe was set to run God had mostly only cared about fine-tuning the details. Not too long after that first planet was sent for divine inspection it was sent back. Didn’t make the cut, he was told. And when he asked why he was told to go occupy himself with some of the other angels and to stop asking stupid questions.

He told this all to Eve as they conducted horticultural experiments in her newest garden. 

Humanity was doing well so far. After getting a hang of the first baby the happy couple decided to have plenty more. There was some trouble with the first few but a couple decades later and they had a decent little tribe going. In the decades since Eden Eve, and by extension Crowley, had set their minds to figuring out which plants they could eat, and which would make them regret having physical form. After much debate it was decided that Crowley would bear the brunt of their taste tests, because, after all, he owed her, and would continue to owe her for as long as Eve was the mortal one in the relationship.

“But how did they expect you to make a better planet if they didn’t tell you what was wrong with the first one?”

“My point exactly! Oh try to give this one more water, it’s leaves look rather sad from down here.”

Crowley was a snake, for the time being. It was the easiest way to hide his company from the rest of the humans. 

Eve bent down to water the plant. “But how is growing a planet any different from a plant? They both need water and sun don’t they?”

“Not all of them. And those that do learn to do it on their own. They’re smarter than plants like that.”

“And smarter than you apparently. Remember how you thought that flower died out of spite?” 

“It was a logical conclusion at the time!”

“Sure it was.” 

Crowley huffed at her. 

“Do any of those other planets have people on them?”

“What?”

“Well you said you made like a billion of them,” she stuck her tongue between her teeth, distracted, as she fussed with a temperamental plant wilting in the sun. “Why would the almighty let them go to waste?”

“I don’t know.” He had never thought of that. “I was told they were prototypes.” 

“Still, it seems like a lot of work to put into something that you wouldn’t use eventually. Hey, do you think we can eat this one?”

Crowley looked to the plant she gestured to, it was a low to the ground bushy green thing, with plump red bits on some of it. “Maybe. Bring it to the cave and I’ll try it out.”

Eve gathered a few of the red pieces into her skirt pockets before reaching an arm down to Crowley. He slithered up it and made himself comfortable across her shoulders. He was a rather big snake today. 

“Eve! Eve!”

Eve jumped and Crowley tensed before they both forced themselves to relax, assessing the situation. One of the younger children -not directly Eve’s but all were her descendants and looked so- leaned back to look up at them, wide-eyed. 

“I’ve told you little one,” Eve knelt down and melted into angel smiles, “this garden is for parents only.”

The child ignored her, his pupils dilating further as he took in Crowley’s bulk across Eve’s shoulders, his yellow eyes, and fangs like paring knives. He reached a pudgy finger out to the massive snake. “Whoa…”

Eve caught his hand before it got too close. “Starshine…” She trailed off, taking in his awestruck expression. Then she smiled and cocked her head in consideration of the child. “Would you like to know a secret?” 

Crowley shuddered. Eve’s voice was as smooth as the liquid beryllium he used to make stars. He watched the desire slither between the kid’s eyes, transfixed by Eve’s conspiratorial smile, thoughts twisting to the tantalizing secrets of adult lives. Crowley couldn’t have laid a better trap if he tried.

The kid nodded greedily. 

“Ok, but only if you promise not to tell anyone.” She paused to let him shake his head and pursed her lips. “But how can I be sure?” She tapped a finger to her chin, examining the child. “This is very important, and the other grownups will be so upset if they know I told you early.” 

As her eyes wandered the kid made eye contact with Crowley. Unsure what to make of this little human he flicked his tongue out scenting the air. Accidently he brushed the child’s finger where it was still held in Eve’s hand.

Eve’s eyes brightened. “Ah! Good idea, my friend!” She stroked Crowley’s snout before he had time to jerk back indignantly. “Little one,” she turned back to the kid, “have you heard of a pinky promise?”

If Crowley had eyebrows he would have raised them at Eve’s boldfaced and flagrant invention. 

The kid shook his head no.

“Ah, I suppose you’ve had no reason to know before. No matter. All you have to do,” she released the small hand and held hers out pinky extended, ”is to hold your hand like this. And wrap your pinky fingers around each other. This creates an unbreakable pact. Will you pinky promise not to repeat what I am about to tell you?”

The kid reached his own pinky out and they shook on it.

“Very well then,” Eve continued, “you can know about my closest friend.” She stroked a hand down Crowley’s tail. “He helps me in the special gardens. We work to find out what we can and can’t eat, and how to grow the ones we can. He’s instrumental to my process and very secret. Do you understand?”

The kid nodded his head.

“And this garden can be very dangerous to the untrained, that’s why little ones like you need to keep out. So you don’t accidentally poison yourself with a plant you don’t understand.”

They paused, sitting in the silence of Eve’s revelation.

“Now go run along in one of the other gardens. I’m sure your friends are missing you.” 

With a start, the kid lept back up and ran away. 

Eve turned to Crowley. “I’m so sorry. I should've checked before I picked you up.”

“Why did you tell him all that? You could have just said I was a weird kind of rabbit and moved on. Now he can tell people things.”

She shook her head. “A secret has to sound good to be considered a secret. And he won’t tell anyone. Come on, let’s go to the cave before anyone else comes along.”

***

_ Do I think myself above the other angels?  _ Crowley mused after Raphael left. He cupped a white-hot sun in his hands and blew on it, making it glow brighter. Matters of superiority had never entered his head before, if anyone had asked him before his chastisement Crowley would have told them that he couldn’t possibly feel above the other angels because he hadn’t realized it was even an option. Sure there was a hierarchy of ethereal power, but that wasn’t a social designation, was it? He had always thought of it more like different classifications of being, like the difference between a comet and an asteroid. But did he think himself better than the others? He was an angel after all, even in the hierarchy of power he was the lowest. But, to be fair, he never spent a lot of time around other angels. He preferred spending his time in the firmament, growing his galaxies, where the only other angel he saw regularly was Raphael who was above him, if only by one arbitrary rank. 

He thought back to the feeling of pride. Was that thinking of himself as better than the others? It certainly felt as though he had been praised for doing better work. Maybe Raphael was right, and that he needed to spend time with other angels to remind himself of his place in the divine family. 

Crowley placed the star he was holding in a gaseous field and used his finger to stir the loose matter and kickstart the gravitational forces. He eyed it critically and nudged a few hydrogen and oxygen atoms together to boot. Maybe he should take a break, he looked up from his work to admire today’s galaxy. Stars sparkled in whorls around the central black hole, it was a finished system and hardly needed the finishing touches he was giving it now. Yes. Time to take a break. 

In short order Crowley found himself back in one of the heavenly break rooms. He milled around and ate an ambrosia bar from the snack table, not quite sure how to go about making friends. It was a large room and several groups of angels lounged about, engrossed in their own conversations. The younger angel shrugged and sat near the largest group, tuning into their conversation. A virtue with more arms than body was telling the group about their design plans for aquatic animals. 

“And then the Almighty says,  _ well what if we go ahead and make it only semi-aquatic? _ And I’m looking at this thing, and sure it's got a duck’s bill and a beaver’s tail, and it lays eggs, and it lives part of its life in the water. But it’s got teeth! And poison glands! And now it’s also a mammal! And I’m thinking to myself, _ that this is hardly even in my department anymore.”  _

The crowd tittered.

“So I say as much to the Almighty,” they paused to grin at the dismayed noises of the group. “I know. I know. I mean can you imagine,  _ me _ , a second-order angel, talking back to the almighty?” They threw back some of their topmost arms and laughed heartily at that. The crowd, sans Crowley, following along. “So she smites me,” they manage through their laughter, “she smites me halfway to the shadow plane for my insolence.” 

The group dissolves into such a fit that none of them even notice that Crowley isn’t following along. He looks to the virtue, noticing the scorch marks along their left side arms, and feels slightly sick. 

“But your objection made sense.” He attempts after the laughter has died down a bit. The crowd started, turning to notice him for the first time. Crowley paused as all eyes fell on him, and he realized there wasn’t another third-order angel in sight. “The redesign was an amalgamation of several barely related animals, including several out of your realm of expertise. What would you have even done with it?”

Not just the crowd but the entire break room fell silent, staring at Crowley with varying degrees of contempt. He held his ground underneath the stares and tried to hold the virtue’s gaze.

Finally, they spoke up. “You dare question the Almighty?”

“No!” He felt several of his eyes widen in shock. “That’s not what I meant at all.”

“But you did.”

“I just… don’t understand. You asked reasonable questions, why shou-”

“And I was smited for my doubt. I’m telling the story of how I learned I was wrong so that others might learn from it as well. Why won’t you?”

Crowley hesitated. “But… there _ was _ no learning. She just stuck you.”

“And that was my learning, foolish angel! You can’t expect to understand God, but that’s no reason to disobey her. You should learn that too.”

A dominion from the back spoke up. “What are you doing here anyways? Wouldn’t you rather hang around the other  _ third-order angels?”  _ She said it like an insult. 

Crowley flushed, though not fully understanding why. “I-” He started, before realizing he didn’t even understand the nature of the barb enough to retort to it.

The room erupted into laughter, all directed at him.

Crowley stood and next he knew he was out the door, unaware of even having flown there.

_ Social order indeed. _

***

Crowley and Eve were sitting on a pile of furs in Eve’s secret laboratory. The cave that sheltered it had an entrance nearly invisible through the brush and had a high ceiling with a section caved in at the back that let in a fair amount of light. She had set up a worktable in the light with the remaining stone slabs and piled supplies in the shaded portion. When inside Crowley could shift between human and snake as he pleased. 

For now, they were sitting cross-legged on the furs in the sun and Crowley had convinced Eve to try the strawberries he had just sampled for her. 

“Oh, these are delicious!” She grinned at him, lips stained red with juice.

“Told you!” He smiled back. “Now what’s next on the list?”

Eve hummed and sorted through the basket of collected plants. “Try these,” she held out a branch of deep blue berries, “they look rather like the ones you ate last week. I wonder if they’ll taste similar.”

Crowley took the branch, examining them. They did look pretty similar. He popped one in his mouth experimentally. “Oh! Those are sweet!” He groaned in pleasure and took a handful more. He poured them in his mouth, eyes fluttering at the overwhelming taste of sugar in the juices. 

Eve giggled and continued to polish off the strawberries. “Careful. Remember the last time you did that and it turned out to be an emetic?” 

“Hmmm, I suppose.” He slowed down with the berries and took a sip of water instead. “But those didn’t taste nearly as good as these, I can’t imagine that something that tastes this good is going to make me throw up again.”

“Well, the apple tasted pretty good too, and look where that got me.”

He winced at that.

“Hey, come on.” Eve crooned. “It’s not all bad. After all, if I hadn’t eaten the apple then I never would have come up with this!” She took a stick and drew four lines into the ground, the set up for a game Crowley was begging to recognize. “I’m thinking of calling it tic tac toe!” She drew an X in the upper left corner.

Crowley fed himself a few more berries before accepting the stick from her. “Bound bweird. Mmpf! By tongue in bumnb!” He tried to talk around his swollen tongue as he drew an O in the center. 

Eve took the stick back and drew another X in the bottom right-hand corner. “I told you not to eat them so fast.”

“Mmm. Borth bit.” He shrugged and drew an O in the bottom left.

Eve grinned and drew an X in the top right. “Got you!” She sang. 

But Crowley barely heard her, his head was swimming and his vision suddenly seemed unable to focus. He groaned and felt himself start to tip over.

Eve looked up and gasped, catching him just before his head hit the ground. “What’s going on? Crawly!”

She sounded panicked, and Crowley opened his mouth to try to reassure her. “M, be back.”

“No. No. No. No. No.” She was rushing to her work table now, frantically gathering ingredients. 

“Beve, I bet…” he panted as a new wave of dizziness hit him, “bew body, ‘ll be back.”

“What!?” She fell to her knees by him on the furs. Frantically grinding with a mortar and pestle.

He looked her in her wide fearful eyes and forced his tongue to cooperate. “New body. I’ll be back.” He managed before the spinning dizziness overtook him completely. 

***

The demon spies the angel from behind. He sits on a wall wrapped in a white toga, kept too clean to be possible in all this sand and mud. The demon creeps towards him on silent feet and sinks to a cross-legged position on the wall beside him. The angel jumps at the intrusion. 

“Care to explain what’s going on?” Crowley growls in a voice that is all wrong. 

The startled angel gives him a once over. “Good Lord Crawly, what happened to you?”

“Discovered nightshade. How long have I been gone?”

Aziraphale squints at him. “Well, I’m not entirely sure when you left, but I think it must have been at least one hundred and fifty years.”

“Years?”

“Oh, it’s er, the humans have designated that one earth orbit around the sun be called a year.”

Crowley’s eyes widened. “I’ve been gone that long?”

“I’m afraid so. What took you so long? And why do you look all…?” He gestured to him.

“Ugh! Getting a new body took ages! At first it was all invasive questions about how I lost the last one and why, then they wanted updates on what I’ve done this whole time! Can you believe it? They take all this time asking for a play by play of my earthly wiles and have the nerve to keep telling me I’ve been doing it wrong! I swear a smiting would have been more pleasant. And then after we’ve wasted all that time they go and just start making me my body. I was stuck on administrative duty while they took their sweet time growing the damn thing, and it doesn’t even look like my old one!”

He punctuated his rant by slipping his toga down and holding his arms out in frustration. The angel examined the new body, it was lighter than the last one and shaped more like Eve’s with round breasts hanging from his chest. The hair was coiffed tighter and moved so differently from his old hair. Even his voice sounded all wrong!

Aziraphale studied him impassively. “Why does the appearance matter?”

“It’s more the principle of the thing.” Crowley grumbled. “I was used to my old one.”

The angel and the demon looked out to the human settlement together.

“There’s rather more of them now, isn’t there?”

“Oh yes, far more than I can keep track of now.” The angel looked a little forlorn. “Upstairs has been talking about sending out more angels if the humans keep this up.”

Crowley shifted uncomfortably. “Oh…”

“Yes, and I don’t know what I’ll do if your people do the same. The temp they sent up in your place?” Aziraphale whirled towards him, eyes big and filled with frustration. “They were an absolute bellend! Had no appreciation for a good civil conversation! It was all _ you shall be destroyed for your continued obedience to the host _ and  _ prepare for your molecular dissolution principality!” _ The angel rolled his eyes with an air of disgust. “Absolutely would not give it a rest. I ended up having to smite them just so I could get a moment of peace and quiet!” He huffed. 

Crowley shrunk back, remembering the state of the demon as they crashed back into head office. 

The angel’s eyes softened. “Don’t worry my dear boy, I have no interest in smiting anyone who does not demand to be smote. It’s wholly uncivil.”

With a slow breath Crowley untensed his muscles.

Aziraphale glanced down at his still unclothed chest. “Or is it dear girl now, considering?”

The demon mulled it over. “I’m not sure. I don’t really feel any different.”

“Are you supposed to?”

“I don’t know… I’ll ask Eve next time I see her.”

“Oh,” the angel frowned. “Haven’t you heard?”

“Heard what?”

“The humans,” he hesitated, “they have an… expiration date of sorts.”

“A what?”

“They don’t need to be smote to die, apparently. Adam and Eve, and some of their earliest children. They’ve died of old age.”

“What?! Died? Whatever for?”

“Not for anything, their bodies simply aren’t made to last longer than a century.”

Crowley’s eyes began to water and he blinked the tears back in frustration. “That’s cruel.”

“It’s part of the plan I suppose, and their souls live on at least. But they’re incapable of taking on a new corporation. They’re designed to stay in whichever side of the ethereal plane their souls were drawn to.”

“Oh.” The demon paused as he took this in. “Where’d Eve end up, yours or mine?”

The angel looked away sharply. “Well…”

“Well, what?”

“Well, we can’t be sure, it’s all very confidential. But...”

“But what?”

“She was a lovely girl, I can’t imagine she would end up in a place that would do her harm.”

“Huh,” Crowley blinked a few more times for good measure, “maybe I’ll see her again sometime then. I know you said it was confidential and all but she’s a smart girl, I’m sure she’ll find a way.”

“Find a way?” Aziraphale frowned. “But she can’t leave the ethereal plane.”

“Sure, but if she’s a demo-”

The angel gasped. “How dare you?” He looked enraged.

“How dare I what?”

“I just told you she was a lovely girl!”

It was Crowley’s turn to frown. “Yes, you did.”

“And yet you dare imply that she was awful enough to- that she could become-”

“A demon.” He said flatly. 

Aziraphale gasped again. “I would thank you not to disgrace her good name!”

“I’m not disgracing- look you said she would end up somewhere that would be good for her!” He furrowed his brow at the angel.

“Yes. Of course. I don’t know why you would want to see her in hell, my dear boy, but I won’t stand for your demonic mockery!”

“I’m not mocking! I just- heaven? Really?”

“Of course she would end up in heaven! She was your friend! Don’t you want her to be somewhere safe?”

Crowley growled, his voice reaching a screeching pitch. “Yes! That’s exactly why I don’t want to see her in-!” He cut himself off and remembered who he was talking to. “You really think heaven is the better place? _Really?_ ”  
Aziraphale scoffed. “You’re being ridiculous. Of course it’s the better place! Hell was your _punishment!_ Being a _demon_ is your punishment! You can’t possibly think it’s a good thing!”

Crowley drew back as if struck. “Well, heaven wasn’t so great either!”

“Heaven is- it’s heaven! If you didn’t like it that’s entirely your own fault!”

“No, it’s- ngk.” Crowley cut himself off before he started shouting and clutched at his left breast over the ornamental human heart. “Just because you think it’s all fine and dandy doesn’t mean we all had the same experience. And I _ know _ I’m not the only one to dislike it. There was a revolution!”

“Heaven was made by the almighty!” And oh, Aziraphale wasn’t doing him the same favor of not shouting. “It is perfect by definition! And if you or those other  _ demons,”  _ he spat the word at him, “didn’t like it then it is because you’re broken!” 

They both froze for a beat as the metaphorical dust settled. 

“Well,” Crowley stood up, “then you should go.” 

_ “Excuse me-” _

“Wouldn’t want the big scary terrible evil  _ broken _ demon to break you too, huh?” He was beyond shouting, he stuck a finger out at Aziraphale and raised his volume beyond the range of the human. “Because, that’s me, Asssssssssiraphale! I’m the paragon of evil! Don’t get too clossssse!” And here he jabbed his finger into the angel’s chest. “Might break you too! Might make you fall!” 

Aziraphale’s face went white as a sheet and his eyes crossed to look at the finger buried deep in his chest. The angel looked back up to the heaving fanged and half-human face seething down at him with a look akin to terror. And then he was gone.

Crowley, who had been putting a good portion of weight into the jab nearly fell over into the wall. He righted himself hastily and stared straight into the sky and he screamed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't know where Eve ends up after she dies here but wherever it is she's on a chaise lounge, sipping the first-ever margarita, and watching Crowley make terrible life choices like it's her favorite reality tv show.
> 
> For the purposes of this fic, I've decided to just refer to Crowley as Crowley unless he's specifically referred to in dialogue that would use Crawly since in book canon he mentions as early as the garden that the name Crawly does not fit.


End file.
